To Be Continued
by Jilly-chan
Summary: PostEW. Noin finds herself one of the characters who survives a story where she doesn't like the ending. Sally. Noin. postyuri if you squint and look at it sideways.


TBC  
by Jillian

Disclaimer: I haven't written Gundam Wing fanfiction in far too long. I'm probably a little rusty, but I thought I'd dust off the cobwebs for Alithea's birthday. Happy birthday to a magnificent friend! I'm so glad I know you. Thanks to KR for the mad proof reading skills–I am unworthy.

She knew the words well enough that she might have written them. The pages turned on instinct, her eyes crossing the print in rhythm to the recitation in her head. When the light flickered, she hardly had to pause because the story was always the same. The choices were cemented in a decision the characters made over and over again. If someone turned down the oxygen supply to the observation room and left Lucrezia Noin to sink into a suffocated sleep, she wasn't certain she wouldn't dream the narrative until her lungs failed and her heart stopped. The ending never changed.

The hour alarm sounded like an infant certain of a mother's nearby response, neither frantic nor particularly dismayed. The book was set in her lap as she leaned forward, fingers flicking across the switches as if she plucked the melody from the soundless strings of her mechanical instrument. A final twist of the last dial to the noon position and Lucrezia was back to holding her book. The only book on the station. It always ended the same way. Phineas died. Her mind was tired of coming up with other possible solutions. They never happened.

One hand lifted and ran along the line of her jaw pushing the thin cool sweat caused by the contrasting sauna of her flight suit and the perpetual cold of space pressing around the outpost tower. Her fingers settled behind one ear brushing against the thick plastic headphones that reported the sounds of space, a constant seashell of perceived ocean that had become a sort of silence.

This time the lights sputtered with a buzz that might have been a locust lodging itself into the machinery, but it had been so many years since Lucrezia had spent any time on Earth she couldn't be sure of the sound anymore. Maybe she had spent enough time in space that the locusts would sound to her like faulty fluorescent lights. Then her eyes saw the green light carving a path along the map of the surrounding space. The pattern of an approaching vessel. She knew what it meant, but she had been alone for so long her mind felt as if it had to dig free from the soil which had packed over her thoughts.

The automatic message from the medium sized cruiser indicated that the crew was part of a medical caravan of supplies and doctors taking a circuit through the colonies. Not many swung their trajectory so far out as to hit the Goshen Outpost.

Static struck her ears at the headset picked up an opened communication line. Then words, "This is Sally Po from the _Sagittarius_. Noin. Have you finished that book yet?"

Only a half million times, Noin thought to herself tasting the ruefulness creeping up her throat and onto her tongue like she'd swallowed a metal pill, "Noin here," her voice caught from disuse and she swallowed hard, "I was waiting for you to come read it to me."

A laugh, "Can do. Well, maybe a chapter or two. I'm coming over to conduct your routine exam, but the _Sagittarius_ is due back to Earth in six months and can't stay long to make that deadline."

She always had an excuse to leave. Noin sat back in her seat for one last moment of peace and stillness before she would have to make preparations for Sally's space walk arrival.

The exam would include an evaluation of mental health which Noin had never failed to pass. It was the only reason why she'd been allowed to serve three years of continual shifts on the solitary outpost station. Then she would undergo tests for alertness, response time and physical fitness which were conducted in the zero-g chamber in the upper level. Only the control center and the lower sleeping deck had minimal gravity in place, the majority of the mechanical energy was used to fuel the life support and outer range sensors. Humanity didn't need another new home world just yet, but once they found another planet suitable for life the project for Terra 3 was waiting to start.

"Do you miss flying?" Sally asked, having just taken off her space walk suit, she was wearing only a dark tank top and uniform pants underneath. The friction with the helmet had caused her blonde braids to appear as undisciplined as the wayward silk on an ear of corn which suited Sally just fine. She'd never struck Noin as being a city girl, having fought most of the war in the thick of the jungles and appearing as comfortable in overalls as in doctor's scrubs. But for her chameleon exterior, Sally's personality never wavered. She smiled, her thin lips pulled back to betray the first lines of age along her cheeks and near her eyes.

Noin leaned against the doorway, having never walked fully into the entry dock, "Miss flying?" she repeated and turned her eyes away from Sally and toward the series of screws that held the metal bracing the right wall to the floor, "I don't think about it much."

"Do you miss teaching?" Sally asked, having walked closer since Noin was still blocking the landing to the stairwell duct. It was little more than a ladder in a three foot diameter tunnel leading to the various decks.

"No, what's this? Preliminary testing?" Noin picked up her eyes to scowl at Sally, remembering with a shock like lightning at how much easier it was to be alone. No questions.

Sally raised one eyebrow, "Have you missed me?"

"No," resolute, Noin took a step back and welcomed Sally in with a wave of her arm.

"Just checking," Sally's grin matched the mocking tone of her response. Noin had heard it before, most often directed at the young, Asian Gundam pilot when he said something rash. And a long time ago, at herself. This was simply Sally's way of putting up with people she loved and their romantic disabilities.

_Romantic disabilities_. Fortunately, the government didn't test for those as grounds of military dismissal. Noin would have failed before she left the Academy.

"So do you have any questions for me?" Sally called down as they made their way up the conduit tube to the highest level. The intralevel pathways were illuminated by rings of glowing light every couple feet. Noin lifted her head as she climbed in order to avoid following too closely on Sally's boots.

"No," Noin replied through the narrow spaces between her teeth, not thinking about the context of Sally's question and preferring to avoid all unnecessary chitchat.

"Hmm, you've become quite the conversationalist since you've been out here. How long has it been now? I suppose you don't know that Relena's engaged or that three out of five Gundam pilots have gone MIA and that Une retired her position as leader of the Preventers to settle down with a roughneck Lieutenant," Sally pressed a button on the panel and then twisted in order to step out through the doorway that opened behind her.

Noin followed.

After a while, Sally stopped volunteering information and simply began her tests with the equipment the station had readily available. When an appropriate situation called for physical contact, Sally would press her fingers along the tape holding the monitoring devices to Noin's skin. Along her temples, through her hair to her neck. Around her shoulders, to her chest. Down her forearms, to her fingertips.

Noin chose not to remember the last time she'd been touched and relaxed from relief when Sally backed away to turn a dial on the equipment and notes the numbers on the clipboard.

"I suppose the date would be the same. The original date. I mean, no one changed the date..." Noin furrowed her brow, uncertain why she'd even started to speak. Certainly unwilling to continue.

Sally leaned forward and her eyes narrowed as if pulled down by the same motion. She didn't say his name but she would know who and what Noin had meant. Then, as if having scrutinized how to respond, Sally sat up and flipped a braid back over her shoulder speaking with ruthless cheer, "I don't think I'm going to tell you. You'll have to resign this post and check the tombstone for yourself."

"I can't," Noin slumped and somewhere a piece of equipment chirped noting her biological symptoms. Fatigue. Grief. Loneliness. Loss.

"And I know why," Sally had a million smiles. Smiles for happiness. Smiles for sorrow. Beautiful smiles and ugly smiles. Now her smile was of undefinable variety.

"It has nothing to do with you," Noin guessed, crossing her arms, and another devise squawked in warning. "What is this? A lie detector test?" She snapped angrily; and was so tired that she didn't have the volume to support the words. She rolled her head back and stared at the ceiling, the movement was enough to spin her chair back and Noin saw stars through the view screen. If she wanted, she could stare at them long enough with the practice of getting lost in their depths.

"No, it has nothing to do with me," Sally agreed, demonstrating her long suffering patience with an even tone, "We've already had that conversation. This has to do with you. And time."

"What do you mean?" Noin asked, weary from thinking or not thinking, "Tell me what I'm thinking, Doctor Po."

Hands on her shoulders pulled Noin back from her stargazing and Sally's face was close enough that her breath warmed Noin's lips and chin, "You think you'll feel no pain if you don't have to walk in time. If you don't have a reminder of how long you've been without him."

"You don't think I know how long it's been?" Noin would have said more except Sally had put a hand over her mouth stopping the sound. Sally gave her such a look. A dangerous smile that provoked a memory that distracted Noin enough to pry free a laugh.

"Yeah, there's my girl," Sally pushed back and picked up her handheld type pad.

"Last time you didn't shut me up with your hand," Noin stared at her own hands, the new veins that were just visible under the skin. She wasn't getting any younger. Time was her enemy on many levels. Time spent alone. Without him.

"Mmm," Sally murmured, "I've had time to come to terms with your resolved preferences."

Noin shook her head, thoughts tumbling around faster than she could gather them into cemented ideas, "Why can't I be more like you?"

Sally stared, "Why do you keep asking questions you don't want the answers to? You know what to do."

Rubbing her numb arms, friction causing heat, Noin knew she wasn't ready to end her solitude. Instead, she asked, "Hey, Sally, before you go do you think you'd have time to read the next chapter for me?"

"I don't know why I humor you," Sally made a final jot and set down her calculations. She began to untangle the cords that Noin had jostled from her movements. Fingertips up the forearms. Chest to shoulders. Neck to temples. Noin remained quiet for the final ritual of human touch.

They didn't speak as they climbed down the conduit to the observation deck. Noin sat in her chair. Sally took the identical companion seat and the new leather groaned from disuse.

"The book," Sally held out her hand and, once she had it, started flipping the worn pages to where she had left off. She set the book in her lap before starting, "It's going to end the same way every time, Noin."

"I know," Noin felt her limbs settling comfortably and closed her eyes, "but it's a different experience when I hear you reading it."

Satisfied, Sally began.


End file.
